


A Dark Brown Finish

by chucks_prophet



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Domestic, But Mostly Humor, Dean in Panties, Dean is Freaked Out, Established Castiel/Dean Winchester, Established Relationship, First Kiss, Happy Ending, M/M, Married Castiel/Dean Winchester, Panties, Rift, Season 13 Elements, Some Humor, Some angst, Spoilers, Time Jumping, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-14
Updated: 2018-04-14
Packaged: 2019-04-22 16:30:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,446
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14312703
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chucks_prophet/pseuds/chucks_prophet
Summary: “What? That’s impossible.” He flicks his head back to look at the two-story home. It’s nice, despite the large, double-pane windows covering most of the street-facing walls (at least for Dean’s taste, anyway—it would make him even more paranoid than he already is) and the dark brown finish (Dean would’ve went with a mahogany). It even has a stone chimney on the far left, next to a giant ash tree. “How can we live here? We don’t even know where we—”Cas holds up a letter for Dean’s taking. Dean nearly chokes when he reads it.“Mr. and Mr. Dean Winchester.” He laughs looking back up at Cas, who, as usual, is straight-faced, leaving the eldest Winchester with little to no insight or support. “This can’t be real. There’s no way.”





	A Dark Brown Finish

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired simply by what I NEED TO SEE HAPPEN ON THIS SHOW, C'MON, PEOPLE.

They know almost instantaneously something went severely wrong with the time jump.

They hit the dewy grass of suburbia like two star football players fumbling into the touchdown. Cas, almost completely unaffected by the thrust of the glowing yellow wound in the air, helps a slightly delirious Dean up. “Ugh, how are you _completely okay_ hopscotching through time and space?” Dean blinks heavily, waiting for his eyes to catch up to the curious sight. “Where are we, anyway? Aren’t we supposed to be back home?”

“This isn’t Apocalypse World,” Cas says, shooting his head from white picket fence to fence before shaking his head. “Nor is it our world.”

Dean’s eyes bulge open from more than the smell of burning barbeque in the distance, only to surrender to the sun shining on his face. “ _What?!_ Where are we, then?”

“I… I don’t know.” Cas looks around again before striding to the end of the stone driveway.

“ _Cas!”_ Dean rage-whispers, suddenly extremely aware of how strange this must look to people trimming their hedges or walking their five-pound dogs. Not only did two men in underpriced clothes get thrown into their neighborhood by a shiny scissor cut, but one is currently digging through mail that isn’t his. “Cas! What’re you doing?”

“You’ve impersonated FBI, not to mention broken and entered thousands of homes, but you draw the line at mail tampering?” Cas sasses before his face goes slack.

“What?”

“Dean… these have _our_ names on them.”

“What? That’s impossible.” He flicks his head back to look at the two-story home. It’s nice, despite the large, double-pane windows covering most of the street-facing walls (at least for Dean’s taste, anyway—it would make him even more paranoid than he already is) and the dark brown finish (Dean would’ve went with a mahogany). It even has a stone chimney on the far left, next to a giant ash tree. “How can we live here? We don’t even know where we—”

Cas holds up a letter for Dean’s taking. Dean nearly chokes when he reads it.

“ _Mr. and Mr. Dean Winchester.”_ He laughs looking back up at Cas, who, as usual, is straight-faced, leaving the eldest Winchester with little to no insight or support. “This can’t be real. There’s no way.”

Cas just shrugs. “There’s only one way to find out.”

“Cas! Ca— _ugh!”_

Dean chases Cas to the front door after shoving the neglected mail back into the box. He holds his breath when Cas knocks. Looking around, he still feels the eyes of every soccer mom glued to his girlish figure.

The door swings open, and neither man isn’t quite sure what to expect.

It’s almost like looking into a mirror. Except, in this mirror, Dean is clean-shaven and wearing a gray cardigan over a white button-down and jeans.

“Well aren’t you a handsome son of a bitch?” Dean, _time-traveling_ Dean, scoffs. “What’s up with the sweater? Is grandma in town?”

“I’d have to agr—” The fourth person approaching the door freezes upon seeing Dean and Cas. It’s almost comforting to the two men to see the same disconcerting expression plastered on his face—if not slightly Stepford-y. “You… aren’t the new neighbors. What’s going on? Dean, why are there shapeshifters at our doorstep?”

“ _Our_ home?” Dean blurts.

“They’re not shapeshifters, babe,” Other Dean reassures to Other Cas. Dean notes the way he rubs his shoulder. He would only do something of the same gesture first thing in the morning, wrapping his hands around the warmth of his collector’s edition _Busty Asian Beauties_ porcelain mug. “I already tested them.”

“ _Babe?”_

Dean’s discomfort grows like the budding weeds in the front yard, and even more when Other Dean gestures for them to come in. When Cas glances over and finds him wearing a mask of horror, he speaks up: “How did you test us already?”

“The spyhole has a built-in retinol scanner. Not only do I know you two aren’t shapeshifters, I know everything about you—or should I say _us_ —down to the name of your first pet.” He takes slow, calculating steps towards Cas and Dean, emerald eyes not leaving them. Though, Other Dean’s aren’t threatening like Dean’s. They’re surprisingly softer—almost amused, even—but still carry a hint of suspicion. “Now, maybe I’m out of practice, but what I _don’t_ know is why your criminal record looks so botched after 2011.”

“2011?” Dean muses, “That was just before Dick Roman and the Leviathan had their cake and ate it too. Before they stole our faces and plastered them on every milk carton in America.”

“Leviathan?” Other Cas guffaws, folding his arms over his freshly ironed blue flannel and black overcoat—a sight that has Dean boggled, “Leviathan have been locked up in Purgatory since the dawn of time. There’s no way someone would be stupid enough to unleash them onto humankind.”

Cas cowers a little. Other Dean and Other Cas take notice.

“Wait…” Other Dean says, waving his finger, “unless you—”

“Plopped ourselves into the _wrong alternate universe?”_ Dean finishes, smacking his lips with a small, exasperated nod. “Yeah, I kind of figured. There’s no way I’d be caught dead in… _those.”_

Alternate Dean follows Dean’s disapproving downward gaze to the pink, satiny waistband poking out of his blue jeans, but doesn’t give it too much thought aside from hiking up his pants. “Wait,” he says, laughing, “the _wrong_ alternate universe? God, just when I thought I left this job behind.”

“Should I make some tea?” Alternate Cas asks uncertainly.

“I’m a fan of tea,” Cas pipes up.

Dean nearly throws his neck out in shock. “ _Tea?”_

“Look, I’m positive there’s a _much_ bigger shock value meeting my Lohan double than being married to another dude,” Alternate Dean asserts.

“ _Married?”_

“Okay, enough,” Both Cas’s say in tandem just before a loud rumble shakes the house.

“Um, what the hell was _that_?” Alternate Dean asks, sounding more like current Dean.

“Look, we’ve been hunted by an interdimensional psychopath for the past 19 hours, so unless you guys are asking for a death wish, we have to get somewhere safe. Dean, uh… _me,_ do you have a safe room?”

Alternate Dean scoffs, “ _Do I have a safe room?”_

*~*

"Sorry, it's just... um,” Dean laughs, shaking his head to avoid staring, even though he’s probably done so for the past fifteen minutes. “I've never seen Cas... or, _you_... so happy,” he says, eyes suddenly clouding over in a way this neighborhood has never seen. "Not since..."

"August 1, 2014?" Alternate Cas offers.

"Yeah,” Dean says, tilting his head. "How did you—?”

"Dean told me," Alternate Cas intercepts, "After the apocalypse, after we consummated our love—"

"Oh boy."

"—he got scared. I told him I would give up everything to be with him."

Dean’s mouth parts when he realizes what _this_ Cas is saying, giving his rapidly beating heart a podium. "Your grace,” he says, releasing a sigh, "Cas, why would you do that?"

Judging by the wry smile that meets his tanned cheekbone, that amuses Alternate Cas. "He had the same expression on his face. I tried reassuring him that I wouldn't go to such extremes. If anything, I was worried _he_ would veer down that path.” He laughs, “But you know how you are. In this universe or the next, you’re still a grade A stubborn son of a bitch.

“But then, when we moved into the suburbs, it became impossible  _not_ to consider it. We doubted the neighbors would be kind or oblivious enough not to notice me _not_ aging. And the minute you hung up your cowboy collection, I knew we were staying here for the long haul.”

“Cas, I don’t care if the earth is part of a Barnum and Bailey juggling act,” Dean emphasizes, “I would never ask you to give up your grace.”

“You didn’t have to,” Alternate Cas responds, only smiling wider. “I wanted to. I wanted to leave behind the very people that sought to pin us against each other—and myself. For the first time in my very long existence, Dean, I’ve felt peace. Here, with you.” He pauses to laugh again, “Besides, if you think I could just watch you die, you’re more morbid than I thought.”

“It’s likely,” Dean replies, refraining from bringing up… well, every time Cas has watched him die. “Unlike me calling you _babe._ I’ve never even called any of my _ex-girlfriends_ babe. What kind of person have I become?”

Without hesitancy, Alternate Cas replies, “A great one.”

 

 

“He means well,” Alternate Dean says, looking across the room at his current self. Dean has his eyes focused solely on Alternate Cas, hanging onto every word like they’re not currently walking a tightrope to save their lives. “I know that you know he does too. He’s just…”

“Reckless? Stubborn? Insecure?” Cas offers.

“I _was_ going to say repressed, but all fair points,” Alternate Dean laughs. “I don’t know, after Sam died—”

“Wait,” Cas interrupts, heart picking up pace. He dares utter two words he never wants to hear nor say aloud: “Sam’s dead?”

“Lucifer, Michael, the apocalypse.”

Cas blinks a few times, as if readjusting the focus on his binoculars. Either his vision changed or his perception of the image. There’s no way he would leave Sam to rot in Hell. “Why didn’t I raise him?”

“You needed to be there for me,” Alternate Dean shrugs, smiling. It’s a nice image—another Cas feels he has to take a moment to adjust his focus to being so rare. “And you were… at least in my universe. I think you knew if you died sacrificing yourself to save Sam, it’d only cause me more suffering. And you were right. I couldn’t stand to lose you too.

“Don’t tell _your_ Dean I said something this cheesy or he’d never forgive himself, but you may not have been able to save Sam, but you saved a part of me that died with him.” He smiles, this time with teeth. “And… I don’t know… I’ve always thought you were attractive and funny in your own dorky way, and I just kissed you. And you didn’t pull back.”

“If only I were that level-headed,” Cas says, sighing, “Instead I stood by while you destroyed the lives of two innocent people, raised your brother from the Cage without a soul, and negotiated with the King of Hell only to destroy the lives of _thousands_ of more people.”

It’s Alternate Dean’s turn to adjust his own binoculars. “Wow, that’s… a lot.”

“Yeah...”

“But you know,” Alternate Dean says, starting to look more like the Dean _Cas_ knows when his smile flattens and his eyes drift off a little too far in the sea of Cas’s blues. “As perfect as this life may seem, with you, I miss my brother. Cas… _alternate_ you… knows I would give all of this up if he showed up at our doorstep right now. Soul or not.”

Cas extends a small, pitiful smile as the room does the same. This one much brighter. And louder.

“Speaking of!” Cas yells over the driving wind of the rift. As he’s about to step through, turns back to Alternate Dean, who’s now standing next to Cas’s alternate self. “Take care of hi—!”

Cas shoots his head behind him to find Dean’s mouth moving in chorus to the same words. They both duck their heads with a shy smile.

“Will do!” Alternate Dean and Cas yell in response.

“Take care of Sammy!” Alternate Dean adds.

It’s a statement that sends double-edged threats clattering down both their vertebrae, but when Dean shoots his head to his alternate self, he finds he’s all smiles as he replies, “Always do!”

And not for the first—and certainly not the last—time, they go into the white light.

*~*

“ _Ugh,_ Jesus—I am _not_ going to be missing that for a while,” Dean grunts as his brother helps him to his feet. He dusts off his jeans and, as he’s about to ask if Cas is okay, catches the pink, satiny waistband poking out of them. He tugs his flannel over it, trying to hide the blush spotting his lightly freckled cheeks. “Cas, everything intact?”

“Why wouldn’t everything be—?”

“Guys,” Sam cuts off, looking frantically between the two of them. “Are you okay? Where’s Mom and Jack?!”

Dean looks to Cas, who redirects his gaze to Sam as his chest deflates.

Dean wants to tell him everything. He wants to tell him he and Cas got blasted into another alternate universe they didn’t know existed. He wants to tell him about everything he’s confessed in Quaker Valley, after Sam asked him if he fantasized about settling down with a hunter, and how it’s all closer than it seems.

But he can’t. Sam’s worn this look out like the spine of one of his favorite books. So has Dean: They’re both at the point where the pages of their respective novels are tearing off and slipping out of their broken backbones. They’re losing time, their edge, and hope. In not only the mission, but in each other. And themselves.

“Great,” Sam says, running a hand through his pre-messy hair that tells Dean he’s been repeating the same action since they left, like he’s trying to grasp the last bit of sanity he has left, but to no avail. “Just… great.”

Cas steps forward. “Sam—”

“No! Don’t—” Sam holds his right arm out. “Just don’t.”

The two of them watch as Sam stalks away. Cas is about to follow him when Dean grabs his arm. “Listen to him. Believe me, I’ve tried to talk sense into him when he’s this fired up. It only makes it worse.”

“Sometimes I forget just how alike you two are,” Cas remarks.

Dean huffs a laugh, “Yeah… two peas in a dysfunctional pod. Like those two crazy kids back in Candyland.”

Cas smiles a little. “I guess it just goes to show you the grass isn’t always greener on the other side.”

“Yeah,” Dean says, eyes glazing over for a moment. “Yeah, I suppose you’re right.”

“Dean, I—”

“Cas, I—” Dean laughs, this time out of the feeling of his nerves catching a spark. “You go first.”

“No, no, I insist.”

“Cas, look, I just—for God’s sake—” Dean silences his rampant thoughts sealing his mouth to Cas’s.

Cas responds, but it’s hardly a kiss with the smile Dean feels pressing against his lips like the tightrope they’ve been walking for eight years. Eight long, excruciating years he’s been keeping himself arms’ length from happiness. “Well,” Cas says, echoing his thoughts in saying: “I think we have eight years to catch up on.”


End file.
